Three
by kiingdomkey
Summary: "Three words couldn't really have been any stronger or more effective..." Nate and Sully fanfic as usual, no slash, of course. Nate gets to tell Sully something he's just never said in twenty years. T for language.


He removed the browned cigar from his mouth and blew a puff of gray smoke into the air. He sat, observing his young protégé at work, climbing and working himself across the musty, old ruins deep in humid kingdom of the Bolivian jungle. Dragging on his Cuban cigar didn't help at all with the heat, but he enjoyed it. He really needed to quit. Gray hair and wrinkled skin was a sign of aging, you know. For a 60 year old man, he wasn't shuffling around complaining about joint problems or waving a cane for kids to get off his yard. Oh, no, he was Victor Sullivan, goddamn it, he climbed shit for a living, still. The life of being an antiquities acquisition expert never let you rest, especially if you had a partner named Nathan Drake, the one who was climbing shit before you were. Sullivan taught Drake everything he knew. He always let the kid know that ever since they met. Surprisingly, Nathan stayed with Sullivan. Perhaps it was because he finally had a place to call home and somebody to rely on, but in the past, Sullivan was a bit worried-alright, maybe more than a bit-that one day the kid would bolt. Victor didn't have much of a childhood either; he had a lousy father. Maybe the kid did, too. They never talked about it, their childhood; it just wasn't something they felt like doing or even have the heart to talk about. It would be painful. Not like Sully hadn't heard Nate cry, he had plenty of times, Sully just chose to ignore it. It's not that he wasn't a good father-figure, no; he just wouldn't be able to figure out how to comfort the kid.

He remembered everything Nate said back then and everything now. Damn, how fast did he grow up? It was only twenty years ago. Twenty years, but neither of them changed. Nathan was a grown man now, 35 years old, doing the same things he did twenty years ago: he complained about everything, he was constantly infatuated with some girl, climbed everything known to man, and was terrified of clowns. Sullivan brought his cigar to his lips again, and turned his attention back to his partner who had grown tired and just sat at the edge of the mossy ruins, his eyes smiling in mischief as he stared his mentor down.

"Whatcha thinkin' 'bout, Sully? You've been awfully quiet, you know. No wise ass comments for me today?" Sullivan smirked, shook his head and tapped his cigar between his fingers, letting the burnt ash fall. "Hey," Nate snapped his fingers, returning his smirk, "You promised me you'd quit, old man."

He laughed heartedly. "It's harder than you'd think, kid." He dragged on it again, watching the kid shake his head in humored disgust.

"I am just imagining how black your lungs are, Sully. You didn't answer my question either."

"You didn't give me a chance to respond! Oh, now you made me lose my train of thought, tough luck, eh?" He struggled a bit to get up.

"You need help, Sully?" Sullivan shook his head. "Goddamn, huh, Nate? Who woulda thought we'd grow so old on each other so soon?" He brushed the light bits of dirt and tree that might have stuck onto his khaki colored pants and tossed his cigar into the dirt.

"Aren't you a blessing to the earth, gorgeous?" Nate laughed as Sully raised an eyebrow at his comment.

"'Gorgeous' doesn't look like an old man, Nate."

Nathan scoffed. "Pfft, you're as strong as an ox, Sully! You've still got plenty of years ahead of ya!"

That was another thing Nate seemed to be deathly of afraid of besides clowns. The thought of his mentor passing away was always brushed back to the depths of his mind. This was Sully: his best friend, his partner, his father-figure and the rest of what Nate never thought he could ever have. Back then, things like that seemed like things he was sure God didn't want him to have. He loved Sully to death and the old man returned those feelings in a fatherly fashion. The two were quiet as Nate looked at him. Damn, was he right. He wasn't as young as he used to be, but the image of the forty year old Victor Sullivan that found him in Cartagena was the only image Nate wanted to see for the rest of his life.

"Kid, are you even listening to me?" Nate jumped a bit and Sully sighed. Off in dreamland as usual. "I'm not getting any younger, and obviously you aren't either." Sully looked at the ground, sighing with a smile. "But, the weird thing is that every time I look at you all I see is that reckless kid from Cartagena who stole my wallet." Nathan couldn't help but grin and try to hold back the tears and the urge to just embrace Sully so tightly that he'd never wanna let go. Instead, he sat there on the edge of the mossy, Bolivian ruins swinging his legs like a giddy little kid.

"Hey, Sully?"

"Yeah, kid?" A light sniffle came from him, but he countered it with an obnoxiously obvious cough.

"I love you."

Three words couldn't really have been any stronger or more effective on Sully. He felt like crying and embracing him. Usually whenever Nate was about spit out those three words, Sully stopped him halfway with the typical 'I know, kid', but now he was just baffled he even got to complete the damn phrase.

As an alternative to such a sensitive motive, his mind suggested he just smile and shake it off.

That was until the kid almost knocked him over with such a strong hug,


End file.
